In a statement last week, Hall's lawyer issued a statement that reiterated Hall "most definitely did not know of any widespread cheating" on the 2009 examinations, or on tests administered during any other year, the Atlanta Journal Constitution reports. The AJC first broke the news of last week's report.

Apparently, not one of the 82 persons who allegedly "confessed" to cheating told the Investigators that Dr. Hall at any time instructed, encouraged, or condoned cheating. The Report's conclusion that Dr. Hall actually knew of any such cheating is based entirely on supposition. The further conclusion that Dr. Hall "should have known" rests on negative inferences from selective, circumstantial evidence.

The WXIA reporter who caught Hall on vacation pressed the former superintendent on her knowledge of teachers cheating, to which Hall repeated several times that she had "no further comment," directing the reporter to the statements she has released.

To the extent that I failed to take measures that would have prevented what the Investigators have disclosed, I am accountable, as head of the school system, for failing to act accordingly. I sincerely apologize to the people of Atlanta and their children for any shortcomings. If I did anything that gave teachers the impression that I was unapproachable and unresponsive to their concerns, I also apologize for that. Where people consciously chose to cheat, however, the moral responsibility must lie with them. I do not apologize for the reforms my staff and I implemented during my tenure as superintendent.